Chapter 52: The Battle of Luoyang

Beijing received that Hong Chengchou decided that Hongze Lake would flood Yangzhou City, forcing Zhang Xuan back to Nanjing, and Shunzhi and the Empress Dowager were overjoyed. 、

Since the Xia Army's Great Northern Expedition, all the bad news has been received in Beijing.

Regardless of whether the Xia army was approaching Luoyang City, Wu Sangui abandoned Chengdu and left, or Zheng Chenggong was pressing forward step by step in Liaodong. Every piece of news adds weight to the air that is almost breaking apart in the Forbidden City.

Only now this news has made everyone in Beijing breathe a sigh of relief.

The only thing that is problematic is that this matter is not a glorious thing, and it is not good to publicize it too much. It's just that the direction of Luoyang City is tight.

The Empress Dowager immediately ordered Hong Chengchou to go to Luoyang to join forces with Prince Zheng and belong to Prince Zheng's command.

At this time, the war with Luoyang as the focus has been fully spread.

Xia Jun won another victory.

This victory was the battle of Wuguan.

Wang Guangen forced the Qing army to retreat, and after leaving Wuguan, he broke through Wuguan City inside and outside. Expand the scale of the Battle of Luoyang to the enemy across two provinces.

In fact, the Battle of Wuguan also has an inheritance relationship with the Battle of Chengdu.

Wu Sangui withdrew to Longxi, almost non-stop, gathering all the people and horses of all departments, and bringing them under his name.

And Wu Sangui's actions also made the Qing court very angry.

While issuing an order to appease Wu Sangui, Bumu Butai gathered to discuss with the Hetao Mongol tribes, preparing to transfer the Hetao Mongol tribes to the south and to the northwest.

This affected the actions of the Qing army in Guanzhong.

The Qing army in Guanzhong was originally used to support Luoyang and Wuguan in the two directions, but now it has to guard against the northwest direction, not to mention, after Li Dingguo integrated Sichuan, he immediately sent a forward to attack Hanzhong,

As soon as the war in Hanzhong ignited, the troops in Guanzhong were not enough.

In this way, the Qing army that attacked Nanyang retreated, leaving a step for the Qing army to hold on to Wuguan. But he didn't want Wang Guangen, so he actually kicked his nose in the face and took Wuguan City.

They didn't know that Wang Guangen had been stationed in Yunyang for many years. I know the terrain near Yunyang well. Even in Wuguan, he also fought with Li Zicheng.

This kind of topography advantage gave Wang Guangen a head start.

It's just that Wang Guangen doesn't care about continuing to advance westward, but because Wang Guangen's headquarters does not have many people, he may lose if he continues to attack.

He could only send someone to Sichuan through Yunyang to discuss with Li Dingguo. The two sides conspired with Hanzhong, as long as Hanzhong was at once, Guanzhong would be like a sharp edge on his back, and it would naturally be impossible to support Luoyang. It also shares the risk of Luoyang.

The battle of Wuguan was a victory.

But the real prolonged war was on the Eastern Front, Xinyang, Runing, Xiangcheng, and other places.

The Qing army gave full play to the speed of cavalry coming and going, frequently penetrated into the rear of the Xia army, and wanted to cut off the grain and grass of the Xia army

, to Xiangcheng area is quite tightly guarded.

Encourage the Qing army to avoid penetrating deep into the Nanyang Basin.

In the rest of the places, a small number of troops were stationed in each city to resist the Qing cavalry.

And drew out more than 10,000 cavalry to compete with the Qing cavalry.

In this line alone, the Qing army and the Xia army combined have as many as 150,000, which can be regarded as a big war alone.

But the real place of the fierce battle is still Luoyang City.

In order to avoid the front line of Xiangcheng, the Xia army forcibly found a way from Funiu Mountain, from Nanyang to Ruzhou, and then transferred to Longmen Camp.

Naturally, the mountains are not as flat as the flatlands, and more people need to be recruited.

The strong men in Xiangyang counties in Nanyang, one is counted as one, and almost all of them have been recruited.

The strong men of a county were organized into a battalion, and there were tens of thousands of horses under Cao Zongyu's command, so that the transportation was continuous, and Cao Zongyu's offensive under Luoyang City became more and more powerful.

At this moment, the Xia Army Battalion, although it is called the Longmen Battalion.

But the camp had already moved north, across the Isui River.

Dozens of camps are in a row, and the scale is no bigger than Luoyang City.

In particular, there are a lot of artillery, not only the artillery of Cao Zongyu's department, but also the artillery of the Qing army. Cao Zongyu's artillery was maintained above more than 1,000 guns, and the Qing army did not do anything about it.

So much so that both sides face a problem.

It's just that the artillery positions are not enough, and there are not many artillery positions that can cross Luoshui to bombard the city wall, plus the gunpowder reserve vehicles, there is not much space needed.

In the Luoyang battlefield, both sides were divided into several battlefields.

First of all, under Luoyang City, this is the largest battlefield, the firepower density of both sides is very large, although the moat of Luoyang City is the Luohe River, the Luohe River in this era is not small, although Cao Zongyu has made a lot of preparations, but in the face of the Luohe River, he can only cross the Luoshui in the upstream and downstream, and set up a bridgehead on the opposite side.

The highest peak of the competition between the two sides is the battle for these two bridgeheads, and the two sides fight back and forth, killing rivers of blood.

It's just that although the two sides fought fiercely, they couldn't tell the winner for a while. Since he couldn't fight head-on, he had to take a detour, so Cao Zongyu divided two divisions, one to attack Yiyang and the other to attack Yanshi.

The Yiyang part did not encounter any resistance, but the Yanshi was also stationed by the Qing army, and it was impossible to attack.

In such a stalemate situation under Luoyang City, under the layers of the two sides, 500,000 troops were piled up in the Luoyang Basin.

Not to mention, after a big flood in Hongze Lake, Zhang Xuan had to give up his plan to go north along the canal, so that he pinned all his hopes for the victory of the Northern Expedition on Cao Zongyu.

Whether it is Li Dingguo's department or Zheng Chenggong's department, the position is a little off.

Therefore, Cao Zongyu has received Zhang Xuan's edict, and all the manpower and material resources of Huguang, Jiangxi, Zhejiang, Jiangnan, and other provinces have been transported to Luoyang City through the Privy Council

。

And Gao Doushu also went to Xiangyang to provide grain and grass for Prime Minister Cao Zongyu.

All of a sudden, Cao Zongyu's troops were greatly strengthened, and even the troops withdrawn from Yangzhou barely repaired, so they went west by boat, disembarked directly from Fancheng, and immediately prepared to go north.

And the Qing army also pressed all its forces under Luoyang City.

The Han army in the north continued to come to Luoyang, and the only remaining grain in the army was also continuously transported to Luoyang City.

The Empress Dowager ordered the Eight Banners to be recruited, both over 16 and under 60.

In other words, all adult males in the Eight Banners are among the conscripts. However, these old and young troops were not directly sent to the battlefield, but replaced the garrison army of the Beijing Division, joined forces with the Horqin Mongols and other Mongolian tribes, and prepared to go south again.

This mobilization is already the maximum force that the Queen Mother can use.

The Qing army's military resources were almost wiped out.

In contrast, the military service system of the Xia army played a great role, although as the war became more and more fought, the lives of the common people were affected.

For example, in Xiangyang and Nanyang Prefecture, almost all the strong men are invested in transshipment.

Of course, this is also due to the fact that these places have been ravaged by the East and each county has a small population. The population is not large, and there is a deep blood feud with the eastern captives, and the imperial court recruits are enthusiastically moving forward.

In the rear, most of the people just feel that the market is a little nervous, so that there is no other way, or the prices in their hands are a little high.

For the sake of military spending, Zhang Xuan didn't care about anything, how much silver was used to create as many silver dollars, and almost every day tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of silver dollars, smashed into the market.

After all, the Manufacturing Bureau can't do everything needed in the military.

Even the raw materials of the manufacturing bureau are mostly from the civilian sector, and the army uses more and less for the people, plus silver dollars are invested in large quantities.

Prices in the private sector have risen in response.

It was only when Zhang Zhen took the opportunity to put in the grain storage that the grain price was brought down, and a batch of grain was urgently transferred from Annan. This is to stabilize the market.

Zhang Xuan can't afford to lose this battle, once he loses this battle, with his current investment, it is impossible to have the manpower and material resources to fight again without ten years of accumulation.

And if the first Northern Expedition is not successful, the Northern Expedition may not be able to become a dog in the future.

Perhaps a situation of confrontation between the north and the south has really taken shape.

And the same is true of the Qing army, which no longer thinks about the future, and now it is the autumn of survival.

If this battle is lost, the soldiers of the Eight Banners will suffer heavy casualties, which will directly affect the foundation of the Qing court's rule, so they will not be able to stay in the flowery world of the Central Plains.

And Liaodong may not be able to go back.

The Qing court was in danger of destroying the country and exterminating the species.

And the victory or defeat of this battle is tied to the city of Luoyang, and the battle of Luoyang is the battle of national fortune.